Ray Mears: Long-suffering British public deserve a pat on the back for patiently waiting for competent leadership

The problem with common sense is that it is not common.

At the Tory party conference this week the Foreign Secretary, Liz Truss told us not to worry about UK-US trade relations, ‘like a teenage girl at a party’. L

Quite frankly teenage girls at parties these days need to be more savvy than ever before, and telling the electorate not to worry, well in my experience when someone in authority tells me not to worry I do worry. I worry that there are even more serious issues that they are hiding. Two weeks ago the Paul Scully, the Minister for Small Businesses, told the public, ‘there is no need to go out and panic buy’. The result, inevitably, was panic buying that swiftly revealed the depth of a much larger problem, a national lack of resilience to supply chain interruptions.

This week while the Tories patted themselves on the back with sickening self congratulation, outside in the real world… fuel supply issues continued, adding stress to already stressed citizens rebuilding their businesses and lives following COVID.

Many of them now face the real prospect of crippling increases in their heating bills in the coming year. We learned also that inflation is on the rise, raising the cost of living ahead of wages, while continuing shortages of supply are predicted to continue into the next year.

This week business leaders have raised their concerns to parliament about rising gas prices and possible electricity shortages, while desperate farmers are distraught at having to slaughter and incinerate healthy livestock.

The Prime Minister was apparently impressive and witty as he shrugged off any concern for the cocktail of crises which are blighting our country.

I have more than once wondered if the growing incompetence of our leadership is their secret plan to repel the migrants daily boarding rubber boats to cross the channel.

What about the Labour Party? Well apart from learning that they are in total disarray and that Mr Starmer would vote for a Jane Bond in future movies, his voice is otherwise absent.

Here is my message to the party leaders:

- Show greater concern and empathy for the team, the nation, us.

- Deal with the weaknesses in our national resiliency.

- Listen to business leaders, respect them as the real experts that they are.

- But most importantly safeguard our democracy.

I agree these protesters have departed from the rails of wisdom but don’t follow them into a train crash. When shaping your new powers remember it is the sacred duty of the representatives of the people, to uphold the freedom to demonstrate, it is a central feature of British democracy.

And Prime minister its not too late to bring home the bacon from our farmers. Rather than stubbornly sticking to dogmatic policies, admit your mistakes and adjust to the reality of the modern world.

The facts are clear, we need workers from overseas, surely this can be managed with visas, every other country manages to do so. If you really want to Build back Better, demonstrate that Britain is able to adapt swiftly to changing world circumstances.

The greatest lesson from nature is that it is the adaptable that survive.

This week a friend told me he was feeling ashamed to be British. Actually if anyone has the right to pat them self on the back it is the tolerant and long suffering British public who are still patiently waiting for competent leadership.